What comes to your mind from just the word hope?
It takes me back to my childhood. Those days when I was well behaved at school (few and far between) and I hoped that on my way home my parents would stop at a McDonald’s as my reward… Would my expectation be fulfilled? or would we drive past because there was rice at home. It was usually the later.
Hope was often an abstract feeling I held within, wishing it would be fulfilled but often finding it was not. See, Hope alone is just an expectation. It has 2 outcomes. Fulfilment or disappointment. All of us at some point have or will experience these outcomes. Fulfilment drives forward our journey with optimism and disappointment seeks to discourage us from hoping again.
During this time, I’m sure some of us are struggling to find hope. It’s natural. With all the despair we see around us it requires one to go against the grain, to find a source of hope we can rely on. Being an optimist in the midst of a pessimistic environment is the challenge.
My definition of hope in my own words is this.
Holding onto
Optimism
Prior to the
Expectation being fulfilled
I thought it was more creative than the google definition. “a feeling of expectation and desire for a particular thing to happen”
So where do we go to find Hope? What if I don’t have the energy to hope anymore? Both valid questions and both positions I’m sure we’ve all been in. Well what if I told you there was a type of hope that had a guarantee attached to it? A guarantee of fulfilment?
This Hope I speak of is first birthed from recognising a need! A need for something or someone outside yourself? A need for a saviour. Christ is that Saviour. He came to save and also to overcome! (John 16:33) this is the assurance we have in Him once He becomes our Lord and we are born again and adopted as his children.
With that being said let’s pause and ask ourselves what is our hope really built on? Is it built on ourselves? On our family? On what we have? On our friends? All rational, but also all fallible as they aren’t perfect and will let us down at some point.
The good news is Christ is perfect and is faithful not just because of what He does but because of who He is. So not only is He our hope He helps us to realise hope even in the midst of troubles. He empowers us to go on hoping by clinging to Him and his promises despite our trials. Christ is the Hope to the hopeless and a Father to the Fatherless.
It reminds me of the well-known lyric “In Christ alone my hope is found” not only is it found in Christ, but it is fulfilled in him as well! (Proverbs 13:12)
All those that hope in him will not be disappointed, that’s the major difference between worldly hope and hope in Christ. Hope in Christ will always reap fulfilment. We don’t always know how or when, but we can be assured that it will! (Numbers 23:19)
At this time of Covid-19 it can be difficult for anyone to comprehend how anything good can come from a pandemic. Nonetheless I want to encourage you with this truth. Once you build your life on the solid rock of Christ you have a life jacket that is guaranteed to carry you through no matter the circumstances. Even if you struggle to see how, understand that God is in the business of making a way out of no way and despite it all he will be your comforter.
“And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.” (Romans 8:28)
Gods promises are UNBREAKABLE!
Whatever your situation whether you’re looking for your hope to be reignited or you’re looking for it to be firmly established. Christ is the sum of all things and the essence of true hope, the hope of future glory, the hope of one day every tear being wiped away and sorrow and death being no more! (Revelation 21:4)
Mediate on this. He has overcome it all and He will be with you until the end! Be of Good courage! I pray that the hope found in Christ will be revealed to all who read this.
Grace and peace to you all.
By Alex Mclean